Nichols TR, Birnbaum AS, Birnel S. "If it’s just one person and you have a bunch of boys then you’re obviously gonna have to walk off the court": Challenges to gender equity in after-school physical activity promotion. Oral presentation at American Public Health Association annual meeting, Philadelphia, PA, November 2009.

Birnbaum AS, Nichols TR, Birnel S. “The thing that made it fun was because we?re all really bad…”: Gender perspectives on physical activity experiences among young adolescents. Oral presentation at American Public Health Association annual meeting, Boston, MA, November 2006.

Birnbaum AS. Opportunities for Trans-Disciplinary Research and Action. Invited panelist at Cornell University College of Human Ecology conference, Ecology of Obesity: Linking Science with Action, Ithaca, NY, June 2005.

Birnbaum AS, Lytle LA, Perry CL, Story M, Murray DM. Rationale and Development of a School Functioning Index for Middle Schools. Poster Presentation at American Public Health Association Annual Meeting, Atlanta, GA, October 2001.

Lytle LA, Birnbaum AS. Selected results and findings from the Teens Eating for Energy and Nutrition at School Project. Poster presentation at Second Meeting of the Health Promotion Research Branch (National Cancer Institute) Grantees, Washington, DC, September 2000.

Rowe M, Pauls D, Birnbaum AS, Blaine T, Forster JL. Youth social access to and provision of tobacco: a new course for community interventions. Presentation at Society of Public Health Education Mid-year Conference, Minneapolis, MN, June 1999.

Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine Health Education and Behavior

Health Education Research

International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior

Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise Preventive Medicine

Prevention Science

Reviewer (Textbooks)

Wilson DK, Baranowski T, Iannotti RJ, Delamater A. Promoting Healthy Diet and Physical Activity in Children and Adolescents. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Textbook in development (I have served as reviewer for the textbook proposal and the first draft of the textbook).

City of Minneapolis Department of Health and Family Support: 2000-2002.

Professional Association Memberships

American Academy of Health

American Public Health Association

International Society of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity

Society of Behavioral Medicine

Society for Public Health Education

Reviewer for the following professional journals

American Journal of Health Behavior

American Journal of Preventive Medicine

Annals of Behavioral Medicine

Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine

Health Education and Behavior

Health Education Research Journal

Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior

Medicine Science in Sports and Exercise

Preventive Medicine

Prevention Science

Editorial Board

Editorial Board of the American Journal of Health Behavior (the journal of the American Academy of Health Behavior)

Other Types of Reviews

Prentice-Hall- Expert reviewer for chapter on adolescent health in a high school textbook.

Sage Publications- Reviewed a book proposal.

Work With Schools and Other Agencies

Member of the National Evaluation Advisory Board for America SCORES! –“the nation’s only after-school program that uses soccer, creative writing, and community service to build healthy bodies, healthy minds, and healthy communities among at-risk youth.

Population and Family Health Award for Academic Excellence, Columbia University, 1996.

Projects

Scholarly Interests and Specialties

I am trained as a behavioral epidemiologist and consider myself a public health researcher with a focus on adolescent health behaviors. I am very interested in the social and environmental contexts of adolescent behaviors, especially physical activity and eating behaviors. I have skills in experimental/quasi-experimental research, observational research, and measurement development. I have considerable experience in school-based research and am now conducting research in after-school programs in NYC. Although my training has been primarily quantitative and deductive, I have begun pursuing qualitative and inductive research as well and I am very interested in gaining more experience using mixed methods (combining quantitative and qualitative methods).

Specialization

My research interests relate to understanding and intervening on the social contexts and influences on health behaviors. Most of my work has been school-based and focused on early adolescents, though I am also interested in a broad range of populations.

Currently, I am the principal investigator of the Good Fit Project, a National Cancer Institute-funded study to promote after-school physical activity among multiethnic urban 11-14 year olds. This is a mixed-methods formative evaluation study to promote after school physical activity among multiethnic adolescents living in urban areas.

I have worked on large-scale intervention studies to promote healthy eating and physical activity in middle school students as well as observational studies of violence and pregnancy prevention. I also am involved with the Healthy Children Healthy Futures Initiative to promote healthy eating and physical activity in young people. I am fascinated by trying to understand how schools and other social environments interact with personal characteristics to affect behavior. For example, I have published papers on assessing school functioning and examining its effect on students' self-reported violent behavior, and measuring middle school girls' perceptions of school climate regarding physical activity.